정체성의 장소: 니키 리의 <프로젝트> 시리즈에 대한 재고(再考) = The Location of Identity: Revisiting Nikki S. Lee`s 〈Projects〉(1997-2001)

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

The self-portrait photography in modern and contemporary art stands as a critical departure from the generic convention of framing lodged in the history of self-portrait in western art. If the latter usually conveys the identity of the artist sitter as defined by the artist him/herself, the former challenges the genre`s assumption of self-identity by deliberately displacing or confusing the role of the artist in the act of framing. In many cases, the production of self-portrait photography involves the technical assistance offered by others physically manipulating the camera outside the frame, which problematizes the way in which the claim of single authorship is bestowed on the sitter-artist in the genre of `self` portrait. In the performance photography, the artist is the subject/author of the art work and simultaneously becomes the object of portraying. Nikki S. Lee`s 〈 Projects 〉(1997-2001) is a series of photographic projects that deals with this shifting spectrum of self-portrait photography`s subject/ object relationship in its process of making and viewing. The artist has portrayed various collective identity clusters including sub-cultural or ethnic minority groups-the punks, the lesbians, the hispanics, the skateboarders, the school girls, the seniors, the exotic dancers, the yuppies, and the trailerpark dwellers in Ohio, etc.-with her own image included in the picture as a member of each group. While she was working on the `project,` the artist actually spent some periods with each target group. Taking a cue from what they regard as a serious cultural fieldwork, several critics claim that Nikki Lee`s work differs from the way in which the artist often engages in an impostering act of identification in contemporary self-portrait scenes-opted and popularized by the likes of Sherman and Morimura. In contrast to their act of impersonation, her work, they conclude, is an attempt to explore the cultural complexity in the field of encountering cultural otherness. On the other hand, there are other critics who point out that her work unfolds a scene of “post-identity discourse,” in which one`s identity is a malleable concept, one that can be designed and altered at one`s whim. In the continuing debate hinging on the subject-object dichotomy in Nikki Lee`s work, one can also include Miwon Kwon`s intervention, which argues that the artist`s project tends to stereotype the cultural others and use their images as a culturally homogenous backdrop that highlights by contrast the artist`s identity masquerade show. This paper attempts to explore what is neglected in the existing theoretical frame of self-portrait photography studies; namely, the viewer`s role. In my view, the subject-object relationship so far articulated in Nikki Lee`s project takes yet another critical turn at a galley setting, where the viewer beholds the artist in the picture and recasts it into an image of otherness that also engages his/her identification in a respective manner. By including the viewer`s outlook in the debate, the paper explores the possibility of how the meaning or implication of the subject-object dichotomy in the work can be radically altered by the act of viewing. With various cultural boundaries that include ethnic, racial, sexual, age-specific, occupational, class divisions that have formed the perspective of their own, the viewers could react to and interpret diversely the cultural others/ourselves depicted in each series of 〈 Projects 〉. Lee`s 〈 Projects 〉 thus highlights that the locus of making one`s identity is conflated with the viewer`s identification with the given subject. In this context, 〈 Projects 〉 is not as much the final `product` of the artist`s identity masquerade, as the locus of production that the viewers` own identity formed accordingly.

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